Fishing: Scottish Ladies prove their worth at windy Bewl Water

It was with great pleasure that I visited Bewl Water with the Scottish Ladies fly-fishing team.

It really is a lovely place with plenty of room to manoeuvre and some of these ladies proved they can really fish well. However, the weather was far from ideal with winds gusting up to 36 miles an hour on some days. Over a week I was fortunate to land fish every day on different flies and lines.

The fish were fantastic - as they took the fly they would dart under the boat and make off at 100mph.

My best tactic was a di-5 line which was deep lining with a white cat and two nymphs on a slow figure of eight retrieve. A drogue was essential after the first day as big waves and cross winds hampered the ladies no end. That said the English ladies got their act together and won handsomely ahead of the close finish between Wales and Scotland for second. Despite having better fish, Wales just edged silver position from a plucky Scottish squad. Scotland's tactics were fast glass or di-3 lines with Boobies on the point with olive Nymphs on the Droppers. All the ladies deserve credit for their efforts on match day as huge waves, driving rain and very gusty winds almost brought the match to a halt.

Still, the ladies have Menteith next year to regain gold and the carry forwards of Liz Fraser, Abigail Montgomery, Marion Wallace and Nikki Ross will be there as they finished in the top 20 rods overall to take up the mantle yet again